[ POLL ] What Is Your Meaning Of "Support"?
… a quasi-existential question, perhaps ...
Or you can admit that it hurt's when you don't feel appreciated. You are human like the rest of us Fnord.
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“Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.” ― Bertrand Russell
Fnord, I see you as one of the high functioning autistics. Very high functioning - successful.
What the high functioning often forget is that not everyone is as blessed. You have a strong intellect - not everyone has. You have resilience, picking yourself up from struggles, and prevailing. Not everyone can.
It is always wrong to tell someone who is clearly struggling that there are winners and losers in life. No, there are people who succeed at many of their goals, and there are people who are pursuing unrealistic goals, often due to pressure from other people.
The autistic person whose greatest accomplishment is to establish community supports, including financial, and then remain stable, is every bit as much a winner as the autistic person who picks and chooses whom to hire.
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A finger in every pie.
Oh, please. You are smarter than that. People are looking for input/advice/ideas. Just because they don't reply positively to yours doesn't mean your input wasn't valuable to them or to others. I don't reply each time I think someone said something important or valuable. I've read lots of your posts that were interesting and though provoking, but I may not have responded. It is a synergistic community and may not recognize individual contributions now or even ever.
Sure, there are people who have the same problems ongoing, but each of us is blessed or cursed with differing abilities and circumstances. Someday one of those people is going to say, "Scr*w it, I am quitting (whatever it was I am doing) and gonna try what Fnord (or Bea or someone) suggested. Because I am sick and tired of being sick and tired." Or some version thereof.
There are several posts here stating there is value in the variety of opinions from this group and part of that variety is Fnord. I would miss you if you left, but if you really feel there is nothing here for you, by all means go your own way. (said with lovingkindness )
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And sky is the refrain - Gordon Lightfoot
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As others have said, it would depend on the kind of support required. I would never bash a new member who came here seeking advice, information or reassurance, there's no call for that sort of thing. If it seemed relevant, I'd probably offer advice on the kinds of real-life supports I've found helpful, and offer ideas for where they might start looking for something similar.
This may just be me, but I've never found platitudes like, "It's all going to be okay" or "I'm thinking of you" to be very helpful, and honestly they just kind of annoy me. If you're not going to help me solve my problem, there's no need to say anything.
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"Survival is insufficient" - Seven of Nine
Diagnosed with ASD level 1 on the 10th of April, 2014
Rediagnosed with ASD level 2 on the 4th of May, 2019
Thanks to Olympiadis for my fantastic avatar!
To me, at least not in the real world -- yes, emotional and mental stuff.
A good ear, a good judge perhaps, a person to trust. A space to vent and worry. And, the rest are references, explanations, options.
Not too soft, not too hard, and are realistic.
... Though in my case, availability is an issue. Therefore many options aren't readily available to me.
Finding terms with certain concepts, on the other hand, may likely help me in a long run. All I need is to the time, the places, some specific actions and the will to realize it AND recall them -- no additional resources required. Some of them are just so simple -- simple to put it down into fewer words, which isn't what I usually could do.
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Gained Number Post Count (1).
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Lose more time here - Updates at least once a week.
I don't always like when people offer solutions. I appreciate the solutions and I take them into consideration but the part that I don't like is that a lot of people expect and demand that I take their solution right away. Even if their solution is the one I choose, I still need the time to process everything that I am going through and I find it very supportive when people allow me to have the time to work through my own thoughts and process everything. I might end up doing their solution and that is great but I might also end up finding one that works better for me. I really appreciate the freedom to explore my own thoughts, process what is happening and to come to my own conclusions which might be in agreement with the solutions offered.
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"I'm bad and that's good. I'll never be good and that's not bad. There's no one I'd rather be than me."
Wreck It Ralph
I don't mind the "Thanks, but no thanks" kind of responses -- they're to be expected. Not everybody feels comfortable trying new things or accepting new ideas.
It's the hostility some people express while they are rejecting the solutions I offer, especially when they deny that those solutions have worked for someone else before and could ever work for anyone else ever or at all, and then they accuse me of lying, trolling, and generally making them feel worse than they already felt. Then others join in and accuse me of the same things, as well as being stupid, ignorant, and an all-around a**hole.
So the best support that I can give is to acknowledge their problem, tell them that everything will be alright, and then leave them the hell alone.
I don't mind the "Thanks, but no thanks" kind of responses -- they're to be expected. Not everybody feels comfortable trying new things or accepting new ideas.
It's the hostility some people express while they are rejecting the solutions I offer, especially when they deny that those solutions have worked for someone else before and could ever work for anyone else ever or at all, and then they accuse me of lying, trolling, and generally making them feel worse than they already felt. Then others join in and accuse me of the same things, as well as being stupid, ignorant, and an all-around a**hole.
So the best support that I can give is to acknowledge their problem, tell them that everything will be alright, and then leave them the hell alone.
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"I'm bad and that's good. I'll never be good and that's not bad. There's no one I'd rather be than me."
Wreck It Ralph
I have seen some helper-bee's get very incensed when their offered help is not accepted. I'm not thinking of Fnord here but another forum regular. But also somebody in my own family. Especially when one's energy and strategy are invested, it can be bitter if one's masterwork of advice, or even opportunity, is unappreciated.
It's a special sub-type of narcissism.
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A finger in every pie.
Maybe knowing your own limitations or boundaries before replying to a thread would be the most helpful, it certainly is for me. Being selective when it comes to the types of threads to reply to is restrictive but its one way of taking control of what you can.
Thing is with advice, its but words with a general meaning. The hard part is action, you cant know what personal challenges or specific obstacles exist for each person.
Even the relatively self aware Autistic people can need more time than others to process the advice, figure out their mental block's, come up with work arounds.
I think one type of people you might be talking about are those who have challenges with self awareness.
There is no rhyme or reason to me when im emotionally worked up about a situation that my self awareness is a barrier to, its like what skibum is saying. Ive a long way to go before i get to the solution.
It's a special sub-type of narcissism.
Very interesting. I had never thought of it that way but that makes a lot of sense. It's like they are super insecure and need you to acknowledge or validate them by doing their suggestions.
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"I'm bad and that's good. I'll never be good and that's not bad. There's no one I'd rather be than me."
Wreck It Ralph
It is hard to know in advance if the person you're trying to help is actually looking for help or just looking for affirmation and attention. It's even harder to know in advance if the person is going to lash out at anyone who tries to help.
Best to treat each one like a loaded firearm and stay well out of their range.
Something I just saw on Facebook, I assume from an NT:
For people in pain/sad, ask: "Do you want to talk about it, or be distracted from it?"
For people who are angry/upset about a problem, ask: "Do you just want to vent, or would you like advice as well?"
That's the paraphrase as best I could remember it. I thought that was a very good idea - instead of picking on comfort strategy that seems most typical and using it all the time, maybe it is better to ask the person what is most helpful to them.
They would probably appreciate it, just like I appreciate it when someone asks if I'd like a hug instead of just assuming I would.
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~AQ 32; not formally diagnosed.~
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